Car manufacturers may hate front license plates, but California still wants you to have them

Teslas were pointed out as one of the cars most seen without a front license plate, but the company says it provides an adhesive mount for those who want to be in accordance with state law. But is everyone using it? That's the question. less

Teslas were pointed out as one of the cars most seen without a front license plate, but the company says it provides an adhesive mount for those who want to be in accordance with state law. But is everyone ... more

Photo: Tesla, TNS

Photo: Tesla, TNS

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Teslas were pointed out as one of the cars most seen without a front license plate, but the company says it provides an adhesive mount for those who want to be in accordance with state law. But is everyone using it? That's the question. less

Teslas were pointed out as one of the cars most seen without a front license plate, but the company says it provides an adhesive mount for those who want to be in accordance with state law. But is everyone ... more

Photo: Tesla, TNS

Car manufacturers may hate front license plates, but California still wants you to have them

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It's the stomach-dropping moment when you see a piece of paper under the windshield wiper of your car, when you know something bad is about to happen.

It's generally either one of two things: Either you've received a parking violation or ticket of some sort, or someone is kindly informing you of some misfortune that's befallen your vehicle.

This time, it was a ticket. Procured, no less, while parked in a San Francisco parking garage.

"NO FRONT LICENSE PLATE," it read.

The head-scratching problem? On this newer vehicle, there isn't an obvious place to attach the plate, like the pre-drilled license plate holders of older cars. Instead, it seems that newer car owners are faced with either aggressive-looking front grilles, or seamless, smooth and curvy fronts as part of its design — see: newer Lexus vehicles or Teslas as examples — and no obvious solutions on how to attach the front plate yourself.

Sean Pour is a co-founder of SellMax, a national car-buying service based in San Diego, and he's seen a lot of the car body trends since the company's founding in 1990. And as he sees it, a number of the cars without front license plates tend to be the pricier cars on the market.

"The shift has been, in my opinion, it's been a lot of the luxury cars where people are very concerned about the looks of the car: There are a lot of newer [vehicles] like Teslas, BMWs, Porsches, Jaguars where they have this very nice front end, [or] big front end where they really want to show it off," Pour said. "They tend not to put the front license plates on, even though it is a law in California."

For Pour, he estimated that the trend for cars to not prominently come with a front license plate mount began in 2016, under Tesla's reign of popularity, with its smooth front.

"I think around 2016 is when it started to really take off," Pour said. "And ever since then, I think Tesla is the car right now that everyone's trying to imitate because they're so popular, everyone's following suit and it's becoming more and more mainstream [to have a seamless front], in my opinion."

The ticket, ahem, gifted to my vehicle was approximately a $100 fix-it ticket — which is painful, but nothing like the cost of a speeding ticket. But as Pour pointed out, if you can afford a luxury vehicle like a Tesla or Porsche, it might be easier to just shrug it off and eat the fine to preserve the beauty of your car.

"But a lot of people opt not to put it on," Pour said, "and the majority of Teslas I see rarely have the front license plate. It's kind of just a game of cat and mouse, I guess you could say, where the fine is just so small that someone who can afford a sixty, seventy thousand dollar car, paying a [fine] is anywhere from around 30 to 100 dollars. So I mean, to them the looks are more important than getting some small ticket."

"I think if they made a heftier fine, people would [install the front plate]," Pour later added. "But if it's just for thirty-five or a hundred bucks, is it even worth it to go and drill a hole on the car?"

As a Tesla rep was quick to point out when queried for this article, the company does officially offer a front license plate solution. If stickers are your thing, owners are supplied with an adhesive mount for its law-abiding customers.

But as many Tesla owner forums bemoaned — and many other luxury car forums echoed — that front license plate really "ruins the look of the car." As for whether most new Tesla owners would ever willingly apply an adhesive glue to their new baby, even for the sake of avoiding a fix-it ticket, one can look no further than a recent posting on a Tesla forum, which estimated that 80 percent of the Teslas at superchargers have no front plates.

"This last weekend I drove my MS up to LA (from San Diego) and back, and stopped at 3 different superchargers during that round trip," the posting began. "Each time I did I noticed that probably 80% of the Teslas at these superchargers didn't have front license plates (and they were California cars). Mine stuck out like a sore thumb with its ugly front plate."

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Still, the California Highway Patrol isn't having it. California is one of 31 states that requires front and back plates, and there's no getting out of the responsibility of installing both plates. For Officer Bert Diaz with the California Highway Patrol, and other traffic enforcement officers, the need for a front license plate isn't just the law — California Vehicle Code 5200 (a), if you want to get technical — but there are practical reasons behind requiring a front plate. A front license plate can help officers identify cars involved in criminal activities, for example, it helps with speed enforcement, and there's also the enforcement of bridge tolls, for those who are attempting to avoid paying.

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The front license plate also gives CHP another way of looking up the vehicle, if say, the rear plate is obstructed by something you're towing, or if the rear plate is obstructed, Diaz said. Still, not everyone is interested in following the law.

"We see a lot of the new vehicles that come out sometimes don't have the proper molding for the license plate in front, your typical molding, but it's 50/50 on whether that license plate is on or not," Diaz said of the newer vehicles. "And I think the main reason is not because the vehicle owner does not know it's a law, I think that the main reason why it's not on there becomes more of either cosmetic reasons, or just procrastination and not making the appointment to get it installed or not doing it themselves."

While he admitted pulling over someone for a front license plate violation isn't the CHP's top priority, it is a gateway to more infractions should you be pulled over for missing a plate.

"The [public] might just think, 'Hey, don't you have something better to do [than enforce the front license plate law]?' ... [But] it is an infraction," Diaz said. "It's an infraction that often leads to other infractions, or violations, or possible criminal activity. It's obviously not high on our list as, let's say, a possible DUI driver, a reckless driver or distracted driver, or even a seatbelt violation. But it is a violation and it gives us probable cause for an enforcement stop."

For citizens, however, there are reasons to want everyone to carry a front license plate. If you're still locked into the look of your car and the law seems mostly like a scheme to make money for the state, on a personal level, a front license plate makes it easier to report crimes that most people would want police knowing about — such as a kidnapping, or a hit-and-run incident — and you have double the chances to effectively report it to police. Besides, Diaz pointed out, ultimately the ticket is a correctable one and has no impact to your driving record or your driver's license, if it's taken care of.

But even officers can have an appreciation for the look of a vehicle. In a candid example, Diaz admitted he had his own wincing moment when forced to drill a front license plate onto the bumper of his then-new car.

"I remember having a European BMW maybe about 7, 8 years ago," Diaz recalled. "And I remember the day I drilled through my front bumper but knowing, OK, this is the right thing to do. So I had both feelings there ... I thought [the car] was nice, but here I am drilling a hole through the bumper so I can get my license plate.

"And once I did, I lived with it," Diaz added. "I thought it looked fine and it just kind of became part of the vehicle."